


Fangirling

by Liliet



Category: MCU, Marvel
Genre: F/F, also probably autistic idk, demiromantic asexual natasha romanova, didn't even try to fight that, doesn't really come up but i can feel my bias influence the interpretation of their personalities, i think it is adorable so there you go, maybe both her and darcy, this is just headcanon musings grown so long they actually turned into a fic thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-21
Updated: 2015-08-21
Packaged: 2018-04-16 13:03:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4626267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liliet/pseuds/Liliet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Black Widow being publicly known for being badass is like Darcy's secret wish come true. She projects herself all over Natasha. In the comics Black Widow could be her secret identity - well, not counting the whole "spy past" thing, but what Nat does in the public eye SO could be. Darcy could BE Black Widow if her life had gone differently, but she isn't, and instead she's a 100% Black Widow fangirl, appreciating her in a way she herself would have wanted to be appreciated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fangirling

**Author's Note:**

> The beginning is weird because this was not meant to be a fic, just a tumblr post, and I'm too lazy to rewrite it properly. The actual fic part starts in the middle of the first long paragraph and hits the stride by the fourth one. Sorry about that. Will probably edit later, especially if I get any comments?...

I really liked the part in the Darcy fics I read where Darcy can be flippant with the rest of the Avengers like "newest fuckbuddy" or "well i didn't guess which war it was but that doesn't change the principle of the thing"

but she nigh faints at the sight of Natasha and the idea of interacting with her as an equal

Darcy as Black Widow fangirl, fuck yes

and also the part where they point out Darcy's actually super badass to do what she did when the Destroyer attacked??? also in Thor 2. I should probably rewatch that for Darcy moments... Anyway, point is, Darcy fangirls all over Black Widow and doesn't really realize that it's because the qualities that make Natasha publicly awesome are the very qualities she has herself and the very qualities she subconsciously wants valued by the others but just... never really realizes it? Because that's not where her life is going, and she never actually /needed/ to be badass before meeting Thor. There wasn't a point in her life where she'd need to show her courage and strength and someone could look at it and say "ooh, this girl is badass". She's got her snark and her smarts and people notice those but even her tasing Thor sort of turns into a joke. Not like taser is a particularly badass weapon. Even when Darcy does get to make use of her badass qualities she gets overshadowed by bigger and hammier badasses around.

Black Widow being publicly known for being badass is like Darcy's secret wish come true. She projects herself all over Natasha. In the comics Black Widow could be her secret identity - well, not counting the whole "spy past" thing, but what Nat does in the public eye SO could be. Darcy could BE Black Widow if her life had gone differently, but she isn't, and instead she's a 100% Black Widow fangirl, appreciating her in a way she herself would have wanted to be appreciated.

All subconscious, mind you - as Darcy's badassery is hidden from others, so it is hidden from herself. Next to Thor and Jane Foster it's kind of hard to realize you are doing something out of ordinary, especially when you've been told all your life that badass is not what you are or can be, you are a girl, you are a geek girl, you are smart and snarky and with weird taste in fashion, badassery just doesn't come as a part of that package. Darcy thinks she's ordinary, she just - really really likes Black Widow.

And then Darcy starts hanging out with the Avengers. Thor visits Jane, Thor takes Jane to Avengers get-togethers, Jane feels intimidated, Jane takes Darcy along. Darcy snarks around easily with the rest of the Avengers (especially Tony, whose spiky tongue has finally found a worthy match), but just about swallows her tongue when it comes to interacting with Natasha, who doesn't even immediately figure out what's going on - Darcy isn't fangirling, she just sorta. Freezes up. She never actually even dreamt of being around Black Widow, just her existing somewhere out there was enough to give her all the tummy butterflies, and now she's fully aware Natasha is her own person and not someone to project onto, and knowing things about her that she hadn't even shared consensually (that infodump of SHIELD database) is just intensely awkward and feels wrong, so Darcy does her best impression of a chair whenever Natasha does or says anything that has a potential of turning into an interaction with her.

Then there is another crisis, and Darcy again - for the third time - accidentally finds herself on the frontlines. And again she gets a small, not really noticable, part, just doing what everyone else is doing. Jane plays love interest and tech support, the Avengers fight, and Darcy is just sorta. An errand girl. Errands involve going under fire and pulling off blood-freezing stunts, but when the fate of the world is at stake, not even Darcy really notices that between one emergency and the next one.

Natasha does, though. However busy she is, noticing what's going on is really her thing. And she has been wondering why Darcy is weird around her when she instantly starts making bad jokes with Captain America and enthusiastically recommending him terrible movies. Darcy's got her attention, and that attention is skilled at evaluating people objectively and not letting bias from circumstances and immediate comparisons skew the data.

And the data is, this girl actually has a place on the team. Sure, Avengers are defined by either superpowers, cool tech or incredible skills, but they are also defined by their courage and willingness to put themselves on the line and to take risks for the sake of others. By their priorities and their reaction to danger. Darcy's the sort who, when she hears screaming and panic, runs towards it, not from it, and so she can be one of them. If only she gets some training - or tech - or superpowers, for that matter, not like there isn't any precedent...

Anyway, at some point after Natasha's quiet realization, there's a team party again. Natasha's standing a bit away from others staring into the window.  
(she actually is listening, but everyone thinks she's not, given she was called and referenced more than a couple of times but did not react in any visible way. Really, she just doesn't feel like socializing, and especially not when she knows it will make Darcy freeze up again. Telling off Tony herself isn't worth the enjoyment of hearing Darcy do that anyway. The girl's hilarious and really good at verbally dragging sexist pricks, 10/10 would be a silent spectator again)  
At some point, when everyone's relaxed and forgotten Nat is even there, Tony starts poking at her. He doesn't really mean to do this behind her back - he would have said this to her face, really, except her face isn't there and Tony just isn’t the sort to let that hold him back from voicing his not well thought through asshole opinion. She didn't do this, she didn't do that, and she certainly could have handled that one thing better.  
At this point Darcy flares the fuck up. She's been watching what Natasha was doing too - and unlike Tony, she wasn't thinking of it from the perspective of "how can this asset contribute to my idea of how this fight should go”, she's been trying to put herself into Nat's head. She wouldn't really think she has it down, really, she knows she's not Natasha and not remotely on the same level. Had she remembered Natasha was still there - had she known Natasha was listening - she wouldn't have peeped a word. But she hadn't, and Tony is just SO WRONG, and she's finally just comfortable enough with the Avengers to actually yell at him when he so obviously and blatantly asks for it, and dissect all the ways in which his logic is BULLSHIT and very much biased by him being used to looking at the battlefield out of a near invincible flying metal suit. And also being a sexist prick.

Natasha - wouldn't have even defended herself like that. She's always striving for perfection, and aware of her flaws, and conceptualizes them as flaws, something for others to rightfully scold her for - but for Darcy they are just traits, just neutral facts about her that others have to take into account and honestly how hard is it to remember she’d injured her leg at the very start of the fight and physically couldn't do what Tony thought she should have?  
(Tony hadn't noticed at all, actually. He was busy putting on his suit at the moment, and never looked at Nat closely enough after)  
(Natasha thinks that injuring her leg was her fault to begin with and Tony is right to be upset. Darcy thinks accidents happen and handicaps should be taken into account when evaluating the final score)

Darcy is more charitable to Natasha than Natasha would ever be to herself, and most weirdly, she's not actually wrong about anything. Well - she doesn't get every single detail right, but she did notice everything Natasha did and her best guess at why she did that is really close to reality, and she really, really /gets/ her thinking. Darcy might not be a super spy herself, but she'd spent hours and days on the internet obsessing over facts and interpretations and psychology and history with random strangers of the fandom, and she has most of it figured out really, really close to home.  
(When it starts getting a bit too close to home, Darcy cuts her rant off and changes the topic rapidly before Natasha has the time to get really uncomfortable with where the conversation is going - Darcy understands boundaries too, and Natasha notices that as well.)

So, that's pretty much how Natasha figures out the whole "fangirl" thing, explaining the freeze-ups and the awkwardness in a much more flattering way than anything she would have thought of herself.  
(She's not really used to the idea of having fangirls, or really anyone who likes her for who she is and thinks she’s cool. She knew of the fandom's existence in theory, but in practice it's just really - weird, and awareness that it’s a thing doesn’t come naturally)  
She doesn't approach Darcy immediately, not before doing detailed research on - well - the fandom, and Darcy's activity in it, and what she does or does not know. It's not always pleasant - sometimes it's the unpleasantness of watching strangers pick you apart thought by thought, trait by trait, and sometimes it's the unpleasantness of someone calling you "great tits, really fuckable" and drawing nsfw fanart that the rest of the fandom politely ignores. Natasha won't go on any such binge again anytime soon, but she does figure Darcy out as far as it goes.

And so, at the next party, Natasha just drags Darcy to the side - frozen and chair-impersonating as she is - and compliments her on her skills and bravery and smarts and ability to keep a cool head under pressure, and also sharp tongue, too. While Darcy's still speechless, she adds that she was, in fact, listening that time Tony was being an ass, and Darcy got most of it right, but this one little thing was meant to go like this, see - and instead of veering into painfully awkward the conversation turns into Natasha schooling Darcy on the basics of fighting and planning and creative use of environment, and Darcy actually unfreezes and discovers the nerd inside at some point, and starts asking questions and offering snarky comments which Natasha responds to as well as she can - rapid improvisational humor is not really her best suit, but she's trying and Darcy is charitable and really good at taking a fumble and running with it until it actually does become funny -

The ice is broken.

For the next stretch of time, Darcy and Natasha are glued at the hip so much Jane actually gets jealous. It's not like she doesn't know about Darcy's fangirling and adoration, and she actually was expecting something like this when she first brought Darcy along, but it wasn't happening for so long Jane got used to having Darcy next to her instead and thought that's how it would continue.

It doesn't.

Natasha starts teaching Darcy - a bit of hand to hand, some history - Natasha actually feels halfway comfortable sharing unpleasant details of her past with Darcy, already knowing how un-judging and delicate she can be when it comes to things that aren't really her place to comment on, - quite a lot of rhetorics and acting and how to manipulate a conversation and how to convince everyone you are in charge and how to lie so nobody even thinks to doubt your words.

Darcy takes to that last part like a fish to water. She's not all that bad at physical training either, not for a newbie, and absorbs new info like a sponge, but the art of manipulating other people's perception of power and truth is what politics IS, and it is her bread and butter. She'd only herself used bits and pieces before - making herself look and feel less feminine, more like "one of the guys", less like someone to hit on and gossip about. She sure is a feminist and feels kind of guilty about those tactics, but they work, make her life easier, and she's fully aware of what she's doing and how she's doing it.

Natasha's taking those basics and pushing them to the level where Darcy could probably copy and believably impersonate her to anyone who hadn't met either of them face to face before, well up to the physical abilities part, anyway.  
(Darcy actually considers dying her hair red. While just in the fandom she'd considered that embarrassing and pointless and trying too hard, but now that Natasha is her real life friend, she knows she wouldn't object and would really just find that hilarious)  
Darcy also learns how to fall and how to take cover and where to look for danger - the basics of how to survive on a battlefield, long before coming even close to any halfway serious fighting. Natasha knows what she's doing - when the next crisis inevitably comes, Darcy's with a team as a tagalong, not a sucked-in bystander, and she's definitely not a burden.

The part where they kiss doesn't really come soon. Natasha's only ever used seduction as a manipulation tactic, and Darcy just - isn't really sure Natasha is on her team, lesbian-wise.  
(Actually, Natasha is ace and demiromantic, and Darcy just - does it for her, eventually. But she doesn't know how to openly show it in any way that doesn't feel like fucking with Darcy's head, and that's not remotely in the ballpark of romantic for her)

But at some point they get to discussing crushes and romance, and Natasha's stingy with personal information as always, prefers to listen to Darcy talk, but Darcy does manage to pick up on her not being opposed to girl on girl action in any principled way, and it's not like she's going to get a better chance.

"I sure would kiss you. Would you kiss me?"  
"Yes, actually."  
"Like, right now?"  
“I don’t really see why not.”

And then they kiss.


End file.
